You know what happens?

Do you know what happens to a plan to sort, sift, huff, and puff toward order?  Your sister and mother move in and all chaos breaks out, that's what.  It's only for a short time while finding a house, but then house prices skyrocket. Now, it's later, and life continues but there is no order, no organized system for stuff, the Shed sits unused except as a storage room, and the solar panels just collect energy and any gourd work is done during lunchtime at work. Sometimes, the lines of Jordan Davis's country hit, Next Think You Know keep running in my head. Ain't life like that? It's a gourd life generally, but you have to make sure to take time to look at things from different perspectives and enjoy the journey!

The Shed

...and here we are with a new building, The Shed: a 10'x20', solar powered shed where all the gourd and art supplies are housed. This frees up space to move the printing presses and type cabinets so they can be accessed and USED. This fall, a wrap-around patio will be installed so there will be an outdoor area to work and socialize.

Groups meet out there to make gourd projects, and/or do art projects like painting the fronts of repurposed kitchen cabinets using the grid method as shown below. 

The gourd project was part of a challenge to incorporate gourds into/part of a book - in the example to the right the book is about how to make moonshine. A snake gourd is the base, egg gourds make the heads of the revelers, and spinner gourds are the jugs of entertainment. The leaves are made from gourd scraps. The Shed accommodates spaces so the artist can leave the project in a protected area while working on it from day to day.

The kitchen cabinet doors project below uses the grid method and inspirational quotes and, as you can see, is a project needing time to do the work!

Another Press and a New Plan is Needed!

 Another wonderful find, which of course became a purchase, and the garage is unusable. So, the options are moving or redesigning the spaces inside the house to accommodate the interest in letterpress. Since moving in the current economic climate leaves a LOT to be desired, an architect was enlisted to help redefine spaces and a new plan has evolved to make what was a den into a type-composing room. 

That way, the presses go into the addition all to themselves, and bottom line to make it all work [the gourds and the letterpress] huge shed will be added to the back yard as the GOURDeous space that was needed all along!  Something like this, but 20 ft long...

Back to craziness!

...and now the interloper has inspired the spiraling craziness that is stuff everywhere!  double UGhugh!!

Interloper in the Garage

...and the best-laid plans can go awry!  As the weekly work sessions of artisans continued, word was received that a Heidelberg Windmill printing press had been discovered in a nearby town, just over the state line. [Background: the man of the house is a hobby letterpress printer and I've been adding to his collection for anniversaries and birthdays for years.]  This is a love/hate acquisition!  He has been jonesing for this particular press for 38 years and now has his hands on it, but the garage is finally being sorted and sifted into a workable space.

Ughgh!

So, the work sessions move to a studio and back patio area.  **sigh*

Back in Business ....

Notice there are two 12-socket power strips held vertically
 in a Christmas tree stand and plugged into the ceiling outlet
where a garage door opener would normally be.

After a concentrated effort of clearning, and deleting if truth be told, the garage is back in business as the workshop/classroom it was at one time. The two bins in front are on their way out and when the cold weather hits the group moves indoors for warmth and so the car can be inside too. All in all, it IS satisfying to walk around and use the space.


Lesson here for all: don't let down your guard. Each day involves temptation to lay something down on the table on the way into the house, or open a bin to get something and leave it out, or move stool or fan out of the house into the garage but then leave it for later.  It's the daily bits and pieces of living that make for a cluttered space. It's not one big party or event that clogs up an area. It's the little stuff of day to day life, left here and there 'just for a moment' that adds up and causes trouble. Just so you know.

How does this happen?

So, the garage seems to be near the shape it was when all this huffing and puffing began. Two festivals and two Christmases have come and gone. The bins are labeled; the shelves are intact; the items belong where they belong according to the carefully organized system put into place.

All this is seasonal stuff: Easter, Christmas, Halloween decorations, plus
extra purchases made against the next great craft idea that is sure to come
when the group convenes every Tuesday night

With some concentrated between-Christmas-and-New-Year's hustle, it is clear items can be put back into place and still have more to deal with. Not shown is the Mantis rototiller, the many collapsible yard waste bags, and other gardening supplies...and a family member's treadmill being held "until she can get back to pick it up".

There are still items out, things that do not belong in the garage.

Clearly, the plan needs to be to acquire or manufacture space somehow. Right now, the idea of enlarging the shed has to be revisited. Three trips to the landfill has honed the trash and broken. Visits to the local thrift store has reallocated useful items for the good of others. Forcing the hand of "guest space hijackers" to come get their stuff for New Year's is the next step as well as talking to our local deck and shed guy. Having stuff stored where it needs to be stored would be helpful.

In hindsight?  How does this happen? What appears to be disorganization chaos is sometimes nothing more than misplacing useful items into the wrong place and letting others take advantage. When the president of a club resigns and drops off all the materials and club equipment to the garage, that was taking advantage. When family members purchase good deals and store them in the garage for later pick up, that was taking advantage. When I use the many lovingly accumulated decorations I am so proud of, but then do not carefully put back after use, I take advantage of my time because now I have to use time to re-do what was already done.

That's how this happens.